Christian Living

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Some of the best advice I ever got was this:

Never confuse activity with accomplishment.

Perhaps you know someone who has sacrificed everything for a career, only to see the company go bankrupt. You might know parents who exhausted three SUVs shuttling their kids from one activity to another, just to watch those kids later lose interest.

Hopefully, such scenarios aren’t total busts. Surely, some good is gained from 11 years of ballet, or two decades burning the midnight oil. What’s disappointing is when devotion doesn’t result in what was hoped for, whether it was a VP title or a scholarship.

Sometimes, things don’t pan out—and we up those odds by getting so busy that we shove God aside.

“You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little. What you brought home, I blew away. Why?” declares the Lord Almighty. “Because of my house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with his own house.” (Haggai 1:9)

Here God refers to His house being in ruins, and we can apply that to our relationship with Him. Is it a shambles, the result of neglect as we become immersed in other interests?

I once attended a writer’s conference where a famous author shared her first experience with writing a manuscript. Countless hours went into this project, but she didn’t research the markets or seek publisher’s guidelines, resulting in a manuscript that was too long for industry standards and set in a time period that editors considered death to market sales. What had her years of daily activity produced? A manuscript that was un-sellable.

In the same way, activity without God means we aren’t allowing Him to direct our steps, and that might leave us with little to show for our time, talents, sacrifices and expenses.

No matter how much activity flurries around us, we’re instructed to put God first. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” (Mark 12: 30).

We know this is a command, not a suggestion, and an exercise of free will. Question is, how do we get that free will’s attention off our calendar and onto the Lord?

I once thought that putting God first meant rising early and reading my Bible before I did anything else. That’s a good practice, but it doesn’t automatically factor God into all the responsibilities, commitments and activities of our day. Through trial and error, I’ve learned that putting God first is a lifestyle—not another thing to do, prioritized depending on what else is going on.

Putting Him first means we surrender our will and our ways, and become obedient to Him. Jesus is our best example:

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love.” (John 15: 9-10)

Everything we say and do should be influenced by the ways of the Lord, and our guidelines for daily living are in the Bible. (Psalms 119:105) Living as He desires puts Him foremost in our thoughts and actions—at work, home and when negotiating traffic.

When we put God first, we’re more likely to recognize and act upon the leading of the Holy Spirit. I have a friend who met some African missionaries stranded in the Atlanta airport, their flight cancelled and money limited. My friend hadn’t seen her family for days, was travel-weary and had a million tasks, but she took the missionaries home with her, fed them, rebooked their flight and returned them to the airport the next morning so they could continue their journey.

This example shows that putting God first sharpens our effectiveness as witnesses (2 Peter 1: 5-9) and increases our opportunities to express His goodness. (Matthew 25:21) For His glory, we’ll strive to make a difference in people’s lives, and big or small, they’re all remembered. (Hebrews 6:10) Would my friend have been any less saved if she hadn’t helped the missionaries? No, but because she puts God first, her heart knew that He had called her do this specific thing for Him.

On the grand scale, does general, everyday busyness reap that much? Sometimes yes, sometimes no, but living for God in all things consistently bears fruit, and someday we’ll hear these words:

Well done, good and faithful servant! (Matthew 25:23)

After all the thankless tasks we fill our plates with now, that will be a nice change.


©Donna G. Morton, September 2006

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